4F
by claudiapriscus
Summary: From a prompt. "Everything special about you came out of a bottle." An accident robs Steve of the super serum. If you take away that, what's left?
1. Fragments

So this was supposed to be a comment fic for avengersgen over on LJ. You can see how well that worked out.

Original prompt by semiseverus: "Post-_Avengers_, Steve somehow returns to his smaller self. There's no way to fix it - nobody knows the formula, and Bruce's attempt at making it ended up disastrously. So Steve has to adjust to a life in the modern world again, this time without the benefit of the serum. Does he conclude that his usefulness to his country is pretty much over, and head to art school? Does he stay on at SHIELD as some sort of consultant but ultimately is unhappy there because he misses the way things were? How does he deal with modern medicine's fixes for his health problems?"

I took some liberties with this, not entirely intentionally...this story kinda had a life of its own.

Thanks goes to **tari-roo** , tireless and amazing beta that she is, and **Catko** who put up with me spamming chat with bits of it and going "hey, does this work?"

**4F**

**Summary of Patient Health Issues:**

Asthma  
Scarlet Fever  
Rheumatic Fever  
Sinusitus  
Chronic or Frequent Colds  
High Blood Pressure  
Palpitation or Pounding in Heart  
Easy fatigueability  
Heart Trouble  
Nervous trouble of any sort  
Has had household contact with turburculosis  
Parent or sibling with diabetes or cancer.

_**Doctor: "You'd be ineligible on your asthma alone."  
Steve: "Is there anything you can do?"  
Doctor: "I'm doing it- I'm saving your life."**_

- Captain America: The First Avenger

* * *

**4F**

_A man stands alone in a room and hesitates. The room is empty but for a few pieces of furniture and a handful of sketches pinned to the walls. Sunlight streams in from the tiny window. It's not much, but it's enough. He stands in front of the battered old wardrobe and pulls the door open until the mirror is at an angle to catch his reflection. He reaches forward and lays one hand against the glass, palm to palm. The pressure moves the door just enough that the mirror catches the sun. The light is dazzling- blinding. He pushes the door shut. You don't need a mirror to see the obvious._

Waking is... problematic. Steve's struggling towards consciousness, aware enough to know he's not yet awake, but not enough to break free of sleep's hold. It's distantly familiar- a childhood surgery, for something he didn't quite remember except for the bills, the damn bills still haunting his family years later- and when he'd come out from underneath whatever drugs they'd given him, it had felt like this. The wonders of the future, that they'd managed to come up with drugs that would even work this well on him. He pushes past it, fights against the pull of the drug in his veins like a swimmer cutting through the dark waters of the Channel until he surfaces into a too-bright and bleary world of beeping machines and furious, whispered conversation.

"What?" His throat is dry, his lips cracked, and the word is more a shape on his lips than anything vocalized. He feels...wrong. He blinks, and the hazy features of Tony Stark swim into view. He looks strained, exhausted- pale faced and baggy-eyed. Nearly twitching with that manic nerve Steve recognizes from those times Stark's stayed up for days, him and Banner both, trying to find some solution to the newest and latest disaster facing mankind.

"Steve! Steve. Can you hear me?" Stark sounds very far away. Steve blinks again. "Somebody get the doctor!" It's urgent, too urgent for the fuzzy blankness of the moment. Steve wonders at that.

And then someone's tapping the side of his face, not hard enough to sting, but urgent. "Hey, hey-" he hears. "Stay with us, man." Steve opens his eyes. He hadn't realized he'd closed them. It's still Stark, his face floating somewhere up above. Still strained, still pale, still manic. "Steve- Hey. Hey- listen to me. Listen. Steve. It's going to be okay, all right? I promise you it's gonna be okay. I'll fix this. I'm going to fix this."

Steve blinks again. He wants to believe him, but he isn't sure what's broken. Before he can ask, something shifts and the currents he's been fighting carry him steadily away and pull him back under.


	2. Memory

This is what Steve remembers:

The world narrows down to light and noise and shrapnel as something explodes at the edge of the portal perimeter. Steve charges forward, head held low and shield held high. Against all experience and instinct, he's abandoning his position without a plan of attack. Planning kind of went out the window the moment the huge, blocky machine Stark had dismissively referred to as the "oversized backyard science project" knocked Thor out of the action before he could so much as put a dent in it. The machine- so ominous and cinematic looking that Steve half expects to find Boris Karloff lurking around one of its corners- isn't even a weapon. Steve nearly wishes it were- at least weapons are directed, not random. He ducks underneath a piece of flying concrete, leaps to avoid the pit where the sidewalk used to be, and dives towards the shelter of a parked car. There's a boom as another strike rattles the street, but it's muted this time- just loud, not the mysteriously incapacitating roar that kept the rest of the team on the sidelines. Steve glances up and gets a better look at the car he's crouched behind.

There's not a scratch on it. There's another boom, and Steve looks behind him just in time to see another building collapse in the aftermath of the latest strike. The debris rattles down behind him, but none of it hits. He glances up. Eye of the storm. He gingerly edges up and looks through the car towards the machine. There's a man standing at the controls, his back mostly to Steve. Steve stands and steps around the car. He swings the shield on to his back and holds both hands out, low and open, palms facing out. He waits for the man to notice him. It doesn't take long. The man reaches for something in the tool box behind him, catches sight of Steve in his peripheral vision, and freezes.

"Peter Vale – Dr. Vale - that's your name, isn't it?'

The man turns to look at Steve, then back again, adjusting something on the machine and showing his face only in profile. He looks as if he's considering something. After a long moment in which the man visibly adopts a poker face, he turns back around and says, "Yeah. Pete. That's me." It's deceptively mild.

Steve nods and carefully sets his shield on the ground behind him before edging one step closer. "I'm-"

"I know who you are." The tone is unaffected. Smooth. But there's a hint of disdain there."Everyone does."

"They know the uniform," Steve concedes. "But that's not really an introduction." He takes several slow, careful steps towards the man, bridging about half the distance between them. He sticks out his hand. "I'm Steve."

Pete stares at him, then looks down at the extended hand. He doesn't reach for it. "Steve."

"That's right." Steve lowers his hand. "Guess this is a bad time for a social call."

The man freezes, then says, "This isn't a _joke_. Is this how you clowns work? What the hell is this?"

"I think it's called a conversation." Steve says, without a hint of sarcasm. Pete pauses mid-breath and gives Steve a strange look, as if trying to confirm if what he'd just heard had actually been said. For a moment, he has the bemused expression of an actor who just noticed that the rest of the cast has not only gone off-script, they've switched productions, too. He shakes it off and says with some vitriol, "I'm not in need of any heart-to-hearts. Least of all with Captain _America _or any of your other costumed monkeys." His disdain is no longer subtle. "I don't have time for fools in spandex and their delusions of grandeur. I've got real work to do."

"Real work," Steve repeats slowly. "You complain about delusions of grandeur and talk of real work? Look at what you're doing, son." Steve says, his tone hardening, "Your 'real work' is tearing this city to _pieces_."

"Not for long," the man says. "It's nothing. The birth pangs of a new world." It's flippant, like he's quoting some b-movie villain to add the right ironic flair. There are some things in the new century Steve will never get used to. He presses on, regardless. "It's not nothing to the people out there. It's not nothing to the teammate of mine your machine nearly killed," Steve stresses the last word, "And it's not nothing to me."

Pete shrugs dismissively and goes back to his calibrations. "The machine didn't do anything. Your friend was throwing tremendous amounts of energy at the bridge- at the heart of a transdimensional singularity." He pauses and shakes his head and something derisive crosses his face. "Feedback was inevitable."

"And the destruction of the world- that's inevitable too?"

The man stops and turns to face Steve fully. His expression is serious, maybe a little offended. "Is that what you think this is?"

"You tell me," Steve says, just as grave.

"Don't be stupid," Pete says. He scoffs and turns back to the machine in a huff. "You understand nothing, and this is _pointless_. You can't stop me. And if you really care about the world- or your skin- you won't try. What happened to your friend will look like a cakewalk if anything disrupts the energies now. So whatever you're planning? Forget it. You'll fail and damn the world along with yourself." The edge in his voice is anything but subtle.

"I know. That's not why I'm here."

"Then what is it?" The man actually sounds angry now, "Why are you here?"

Steve doesn't answer him, not directly. "Pete- why are you doing this?" Pete says nothing, just works his jaw. "We know what you're doing," Steve continues, "Even a little of the how, even if it is all over my head. No one has really tackled the why, and that bothers me. SHIELD's been operating on the assumption that you're just another megalomaniac. They deal with them often enough. And your file-

"There's a file?"

"Pete. There's _always_ a file. Especially for people who are suspected of having ties to HYDRA."

"I'm not working with HYDRA." The scorn is back. "There were a few components I needed that you can't get on craigslist. They were willing to deal."

"You've got to know how this looks," Steve says. He glances uneasily at the machine. He's not sure how much time is left, but he can feel the weight of it pressing down on him. Unfortunately, he's got a feeling that there's only one way to turn this around, and it's to get through to the man who even now is still tinkering with the controls. "And you had to have known who you were getting in bed with when you did business with them. I've read your file, Pete. You had a job- a life, a family. Volunteered regularly down at a local shelter. Guy like that, he doesn't work with the likes of HYDRA or build transdimensional gizmos for no reason," Steve says, punctuating the sentence with a broad gesture. Pressing further, he says, "Tell me. Pete, why are you doing this? Why abandon that life? Why risk the whole world? What do you have to gain? What are you trying to do?"

The man throws up his hands. "Go rescue a kitten from a tree, Captain. I promise I'll put everything back when I'm done," he says. "I'll even throw in a new paint job." His tone drips sarcastic obsequiousness.

"Paint jobs usually require that the walls still be standing, Pete. There're at least a six hundred people outta their homes, out of their jobs because of what you've done. And there are some things you just can't fix."

"I'm not a murderer." The words are bitten off, sharp. He's angry now. Steve has finally found a nerve.

"Pete," Steve says, waiting until he's caught the man's eye before continuing, "How do you think this ends?"

The man glances away, back at the machine, then back at Steve. "It's going to be better," he says. "A whole new world, Captain," Pete says, and Steve wonders who he's trying to convince more: himself, or Steve. "None of this- none of the damage, or any injuries, or even this conversation- has to happen. We can change it."

"What is it you're trying to change? Help me understand, Pete. What's worth collapsing two entire universes?"

"A girl, what else?" It's falsely hearty. The man forces a brief, quick smile, but it's belied by the sudden shine in his eyes and the way he blinks and looks away. "It's not collapsing universes," he says a second later, his tone gruff and deliberate. "It's a merger. There are realities that only exist _in potentia _until they're observed and realized. That's what I'm doing. Forcing this world to take a slightly different path. You won't be able to tell the difference, you see? There's no danger here, Captain. You can't stop me but you don't need to. This will be over soon, nothing more than a bad dream."

"That's what we're afraid of, Pete," Steve says. "I'm not a scientist, but I know some of the smartest on the planet and your little project here has them- concerned. If whatever you're trying to accomplish here is so minor-"

"Significance has no bearing on importance," the man snaps. "Don't worry, Captain, you're not going to wake up to a world controlled by the Nazis or giant flying squid-" the scorn is heavy in his voice - "And it's worth the goddamn risk. Which was _negligible_ until you and your friend showed up. So just... _fuck off_ and let me get back to not destroying the universe in peace." The man turns back to his machine and starts flipping switches and tapping screens with ruthless intent.

And then it all clicks- Steve knows what this is. The man's disdain and bubbling hostility. His focus. _A girl, what else?_ There was nothing in the file, but Steve knows he's right. He waits a moment and says, "Who was she? Who did you lose?"

Pete stays stretched out over the console, still tinkering, but the frenzy is gone and his movements slow until he stops entirely. He grips the side of the machine, knuckles white, like it's the only thing keeping him standing. It's not far from the truth, Steve knows. "My daughter," the man says at last.

"I'm sorry," Steve says simply. "I didn't know."

"No, I imagine you wouldn't," Pete says, and there's that edge again, "You were kind of busy at the time."

Steve's heart sinks. He'd wanted to be wrong- he'd wanted not to have to go digging in a wound so raw. "It wasn't in your file," he says.

"No," Pete says, "She wouldn't have been. Her mother-" he stops again, as if lost to some inner vision. "She was never one for the formalities."

"So tell me," Steve says.

"When Marnie came along-" he breaks off, lips pressed together. The memory is joyful but his grief is sharp and deep. The sight cuts deeply into Steve's own psyche, rooting up the ghosts he's tried so hard to lay to rest.

"Neither of us were born to be parents," Pete remarks at last, almost off-hand. "And until it actually happened, I'd never even thought about having kids. And Susan and I were always better friends than we were ever lovers. But our daughter...she was_ wanted_. She was loved." His voice breaks. "More than anything I've ever done, more than anything I'll ever do, she mattered."

"You moved to New York," Steve says, filling in the blanks. "You turned down offers from Cambridge and MIT for a position at ESU. Your daughter?"

"Yeah. She was here. And when the opportunity came up...I wanted to see her grow. Wanted to be here. I'd missed too much." The loss in his voice is a yawning chasm, and it nearly swallows Steve whole.

"What happened- What happened to her, Pete?" Somewhere outside the bubble, outside the eye of the storm, there's another boom and another crash, and in the back of Steve's mind, he knows time is growing short. But he can't rush this, can't seem to break the spell.

Pete doesn't answer him, not directly. He stares off into the middle distance. "She was so certain she was gonna save the world. Didn't even have the patience to wait." He stops, swallows hard. Swallows and clears his throat. "You probably didn't know this, but there were these street protests the day-" he falters. "That day. She shouldn't have even been there. She'd skipped class. God, when everything first went to hell, my first thought was _at least she's away from it_. Instead she was right in the middle. Ground zero for a goddamn alien armada."

Steve nods. He remembers: all of their attempts to turn back to tide, and how futile it felt as buildings fell all around them.

"They ran. And she was free and clear, she should have been _fine_- when she saw some _asshole _with his leg in a cast struggling to get out. She went back for him. The building collapsed." His lips tighten, but his voice becomes distant. "I saw him, in the hospital. He wanted to express his _thanks_. His _gratitude_ at her goddamn _sacrifice._ He made it, she didn't. Some piece of shit investment banker. Never contributed a single thing to society, and this is the man my daughter died for? No. No." He looks up at Steve, and his eyes are burning. "It shouldn't have happened. And now it's not gonna. A little nudge of the universe, and she'll be fine. It'll be okay. And what will the world care? No one will notice a difference. No one will care if there's one less asshole on this planet. Tell me I'm wrong."

"I can't," Steve says, and something in the man's face gives. It's relief, it's validation, it's gratitude. But Steve isn't done, though he regrets what he's about to do."You're right. Significant is not the same thing as important." Relief washes through the other man so visibly it's nearly a tide. But Steve isn't done. "Maybe the world never notices a difference. But I think that's the answer to the wrong question, Pete. The world won't know the difference...but will you?"

Pete blinks, startled and bemused. "What?"

"You said it's an unrealized possibility. Not an actual alternate universe, right? Why?" Pete says nothing."I'm betting it's choice. That's what you're changing, isn't it? Trying to nudge things into a world where your daughter doesn't go back for the man in the building."

"...yeah." The man scrubs hard at his head and then rubs his eyes."Highest probability of success, lowest probability of accidentally destroying the universe."

"Pete, if you negate her choices...negate _those_ choices- you said she wanted to save the world. Wanted to help people. If you erase that, how can you be sure that she'll still be your daughter?"

"No- no. This will work. What's one decision, against a lifetime?"

"I didn't know her," Steve says, and he speaks with simple regret. "And I can't claim to know which of her choices would be the ones to define her. That's not my question to answer. But you said she went back for him, Pete. _**There**_**, **_**on that day**_**,** when people were running and people were screaming and there were nightmares in the sky and buildings crashing to the ground...your daughter saw a man she didn't know struggling and _she went back for him_." Steve breathes deep through his nose and steps closer to the grieving man. When he speaks again, it's slower and more deliberate. "But I do know it wasn't an accident, Pete. What she did- it's not a whim. She was your daughter, Pete. Do you think even for a moment that she didn't know what she was doing- didn't know what she was risking- when she decided to go back for that man?"

"Damn you." Pete is shaking now, and his hands grip the side of the machine with white-knuckled intensity. "Of course I know! She was my _daughter. _And I don't care. I don't care. She shouldn't have done it." His voice breaks. "She deserved so much better."

"And this?"

"What?"

Steve gestures to the destruction still going on around them, just outside the bubble. 'Does she deserve this, Pete? Is this the monument you're going to build to her memory?"

"I told you, none of that will matter when-"

"_**If, **_Pete. If. If it doesn't cause the universe to collapse. If it works. If a girl who ignores the sight of another in trouble will still be the daughter you're mourning. And even then-"

"What? What regrets do you imagine I could have worse than I already do?"

Steve doesn't answer him, just looks meaningfully around at the machine and the still, calm circle around it. "I don't pretend to understand the science behind what you're doing here. But from what I did understand, this is protected, isn't it? From more than just the energy strikes and falling rubble."

Pete watches him carefully- suspiciously- but answers anyway. "Nothing within a twelve meter radius of the machine can be affected by the singularity. Anything else would risk a paradox that would definitely destroy the universe."

Steve takes another step forward and broadly gestures to the circle around them. "So nothing inside the boundary will change." Pete nods, and Steve purses his lips. "You asked me what could be worse than the regret you already carry. And I think this is it, Pete. Because you'll remember. When everything else is gone, when everything else has changed, you'll remember your brave girl who once gave her life to save a man, and how you destroyed the world as it was to change her."

Pete shakes his head, but his tone is desperate. "No. No. You're wrong. It'll be her. And she'll be fine. Happy and alive." Something in his face shatters. "That's all I wanted."

"I know," Steve says. The man is looking to him for some comfort, some platitude, but Steve can't provide it. There is nothing he or anyone could do to make this okay. "But Pete...It's too late for that. Sometimes we don't get much say in the matter."

Pete goes completely still, his gaze still locked on Steve's face. And his eyes- Steve watches as something behind those eyes breaks. "No," he says. And then the man moves, and it's startling in his quickness and in his strength. "No!" He pounds the console with his fists, scattering the tools he'd been earlier using. He trows a lever, grabs a wrench and _twists_ until the lever breaks. Sparks fly, and the energy the machine has been throwing off becomes erratic. Steve leaps forward, wrestling the wrench away from the man, and pulling him away from the machine. The man howls and fights back his blows uncoordinated and unplanned, but falling with all the strength of a beserker fury.

"Stop," Steve yells. "Pete, stop." He tosses the man to the ground, away from the machine. The man sprawls across the pavement and stays there, his forehead pressed into the ground. He rolls on to his side, hand pressed into his face, his fingers covering his eyes. "Oh God," he says. "Why? She shouldn't have been there." He's crying now, tears streaming down his face, but Steve has no time for that. He's standing helplessly in front of the machine, in front of an overwhelming array of controls and displays and open panels with wiring and circuit boards peeking out. He's not an engineer an his scientific know-how is seventy years out of date in any case. He spins around and drags the man off the ground. "I need you to stop it, Pete." The man just shakes his head, still lost in his grief. Steve shakes him. "Tell me how to stop it."

"You can't," the man says. "It's too late."

Steve looks around desperately for some answer, some clue. "Where's the power? Tell me how to turn it off!"

The man raises one shaky arm and points directly into the heart of the bridge. The singularity, the man had called it. Beneath the bright glow, Steve can just make out some shadowy object. He lets go of Pete, who falls to the ground bonelessly. Steve runs back to his shield, picks it up, and gives the light an appraising look. He takes a deep breath and hopes Stark was right about 'temporal inertia'. He holds his shield up and in position, then takes a run at the machine, jumping up and diving directly into the light when he reaches its edge. He can feel every pulse in his bones as he falls. There's a timeless moment, and then- he's falling. He hits the ground, and feels something dislodge as he does. He can't see, the light's too bright, but he tears at whatever it was with all his strength. He feels it give. Everything goes white and blinding, like the sun's reflection in glass.

And then it shatters, and he shatters with it.


	3. Dream

Steve dreams, but they're muted, soft things, gone before he can catch hold of them He's distantly aware of a steady voice speaking in low and edged tones. It's still not waking, but it's the closest he's been to true awareness in a while. There's a room filled with the whirring and beeping of machines and the clatter of footsteps down a hall. He can't quite reach it, can't quite break through, but it's an anchor in the sea in which he's been drifting. He thinks: _significance has no bearing on importance_, but he can't place it, can't remember why it matters. The sounds and conversations of the waking world filter down like sun through the sea, present but distant.

He hears: "It's not like the guy doesn't deserve a vacation. He's technically been on active duty since what, the second world war? Maybe-"

"Maybe he'll actually _thank_ us?" It drips sarcasm.

There's a pause. Then, quietly: "He's not going to blame you for this, Tony. It wasn't your fault."

"Yeah, well, then whose fault was it?"

A different voice breaks in: "Far be it for me to rain on your pity party, Stark, but maybe it was the guy with the interdimensional bridge to a goddamn parallel universe and the full blown god complex." A beat. "Banner's right. After all he's done, who the hell is going to begrudge him retirement? You?"

Adds a woman's voice: "He's alive. That counts for something."

"Not enough." Silence falls, and Steve loses his grip on the moment, and it changes. He's no longer audience to a distant, unknown conversation. There's a doctor standing in front of him. The doctor is writing in a file and Steve knows what it says. 4-F, 4-F, 4-F. _You ought to thank me,_the doctor says, and there's something familiar about his face. Before Steve can place it, it's changed again, but it doesn't matter, because the man won't change his mind. _I'm saving your life. _And suddenly Steve can't even speak. He knows he should be arguing, should be pleading for his chance, but the words won't come. As if he should be grateful. As if it's a relief. As if he's a coward, to take comfort in being safe at home while good men are out there putting their lives on the line.

_It's not cowardice. _Another voice, another memory. Another ghost._. Steve, it's not. The home front- it matters. You could probably do more here than you ever could do overseas. _

Oh yeah, says his own voice_,_ and what the heck do you think I'm gonna do that's so important- go to work drawing for the funnies? Plant a victory garden?

_Maybe. Maybe that's exactly it. _The answer's defiant. _What's wrong with any of that? It's not called the war effort for nothing. Everyone's sacrificing. Everyone's doing their part. You don't think any of that matters?_

It's not that. It's just that...I can't, Bucky, I just can't.

_Can't what? _

Can't stay behind safe and sound, just waiting to see who won't be coming back.

_Steve, I don't think you get much say in the matter._

There's a response to that, a retort that's right on the tip of his tongue, but it's fading now, and Steve is drifting again, and the waters in which he drifts are dark and deep. Time passes.

"What do you think he'll do?" someone says.

"I don't know. I don't think any of us know him well enough."

"Are you kidding me, 'Tasha?"

"He had another life, once. Before all this. We've never known that man."

"Plenty. C'mon. You really think he's got that many deep dark secrets?"

"It's not about secrets. It's about rebirth. You of all people should know that."

"Don't be like that. Steve's not you. He's...Steve. What you see is what you get. He's a literal poster child, for god's sake."

"Of the two of us, which one is better at reading people?"

"Don't you trust my instincts?"

"You mean the instincts that led to that incident in Rumekistan?"

"Jesus, that was one time. I'm telling you, nothing's changed, nothing's gonna change. He's still Steve."

"You're wrong. And you should be glad."

"Why would you say that?"

"His whole world is gone. Has been gone. And now this too. Trust me when I say that duty is a cold comfort. He's got something else driving him- but what that is...and more importantly, what it _was-_I don't know. Anyone who did is probably long dead."

The other voice mumbles something in reply, but Steve misses it. There's an echo- _Is this the monument you want to build to her memory? - _but it's a memory, not an answer. It doesn't matter: Someone's humming, and it's all he can hear, for the voice is familiar even if the tune is not. There's a cool touch on his forehead as someone brushes his hair back and presses a kiss gently on his brow- his heart leaps. It's a joy he doesn't question.

"Mom?"

A hand squeezes his. _Who else? Wake up, sleepyhead. _She's sitting at his bedside, as she had so many times before. Still in her nurse's uniform, fresh off her shift, tired but content.

"Mom?" He blinks back tears. He's a child and he's grown and he's old Steve and he's Captain America, but his mother is here and none of it matters. "I tried so hard-" He breaks off. It's not enough. He wants her to know, but the words won't come. 'Those first few years-"

_Shh, that's over now. I'm here. Everything will be fine, you'll see. It'll look better in the morning-_

"It always does," he finishes. She smiles. "I missed you."

_My boy, my darling boy. What am I to do with you?_

"I don't understand."

_Always looking for trouble_. _Picking fights you can't win._

"I don't go looking for them, mom. They tend to find me."

_Hmmph. _Her expression lets him know exactly what she thinks of that excuse. _You must be more careful, son of mine, if anything happened to you, you'd break your mother's heart._

"And what about you? Shouldn't you be careful too? Why won't you transfer to another ward? I know you can."

_None of that, Steve. It's the Lord's work I'm doing, and I won't hear a word said against it. I'm needed._

"I know- I know. I'm not knocking it. But the Lord's got something against babies? Or, or- the elderly? They don't count as God's work?"

_Shush, now. _

He shakes his head. His throat swells. "It hurt to lose you. To watch you go, coughing blood and fading away. Didn't you know that? You should have. You saw it enough on the ward, tell me you didn't. Why risk it? Hasn't our family already given enough?"

_Sacrifice isn't a debt to be paid off, mo stór. It's a gift. The poor souls in the ward are shown so little kindness in their final days. How could I do any differently?_

"Someone else-"

_Many people say that, when asked to do the work. _She smiles, wan and tired. _Being_ _th_e_ somebody-else is isn't what I wanted, but I won't regret it, and neither should you, Steve. Your father-_

"The mustard gas. He gave up his mask- I know. You told me before."

_Well, I'm telling you again. There was a boy, a boy who had no business being there._

Steve recites the end of the story: "And he saved him. He couldn't do nothing and watch the boy die."

_Yes_. _I loved your father, you know._

"I know."

She squeezes his hand. _But I never regretted his choice. You were so young then, you surely don't remember. He wrote me from his death bed. I never told you. I was waiting for you to be old enough to understand._

"You told me," Steve says, "You told me when I was fifteen and you were the one dying." She doesn't give any sign of hearing him.

_He said he loved me, and that he was sorry, but were he confronted with the same choice, he could never choose differently. He was a _good _man. He was a man who never considered the cost to himself before acting in the service of others, and I loved him for it. To wish he had chosen differently would have been a rebuke to the man I took as my husband. _She smiles weakly. _You're a good boy. One day you'll understand. _

_He is a good __man__,_ says Doctor Erskine, handing Steve's mother a glass of of schnapps, _and he has a good heart. You should be proud. _

His mother toasts the doctor before swallowing the drink down- his mother, who never touched a drop of liquor in her whole life- and dropping the glass to shatter on the floor. It glitters like a sun burst in the light. _I am,_ she says, _but I worry so, doctor. _

_Ah, never fear, my dear Mrs. Rogers, _says Erskine, _I shall soon fix your boy up better than new._

She coughs, turning away until the fit has passed. And when she turns back, blood blossoms like roses across the crisp white of her uniform. _I'm glad,_ she says, _he needs someone to look after him. He's too frail for a world as hard as this one._

_Is that so, _Erskine says, looking directly at Steve. _Who could guess? But we are all frail in times like these. A toast to Captain America - oh no, what am I thinking, you have a procedure in the morning. _The dream shifts, and he's no longer in the apartment he shared with his mother, but sitting on a bunk in the barracks across from Dr. Erskine.

"Tell me I didn't look half as ridiculous as I felt out there today."

_That will not be possible, I am afraid. But it was a good thing you did, and it impressed the Colonel. _

"That's not why I did it."

_That much is obvious.I am glad, however, that your noble self-sacrifice was entirely unnecessary. You would have left me without my test subject, and that would not do. I think I am owed an apology._

"Sorry," Steve says, feeling more chagrin than he ought.

The doctor smiles. _Just my little joke. But you should not feel bad. It's a burden, my father would say, that none of us may know what kind of man we will be until we're tested. You are a lucky man. For you, there is no more guessing. And that should be worth a small measure of ridiculous, don't you think? _

"I think you give me too much credit. I was closest to the grenade, that was all."

_Hmmph. Well. We shall see, hmm? But plenty of time for that later. I should go- you need your rest. Tomorrow is a very big day._

Erskine sets his glass on the floor, right at the center of the sunburst remains of Steve's mother's glass. It cracks and and shatters and joins all the other pieces lying on the floor. But when Steve bends down, he finds no glass. Just endless pieces of ice. The ice shards make up pieces of an imperfect mirror, showing him cloudy versions of his face- of his faces. He turns away. It's all ice. There's nothing else- and he's crashing, the plane is crashing, but it's okay, he understands now-

And then there's nothing. He sleeps.

* * *

"They say it's only a matter of time. There's nothing-"

"Nothing wrong?" It's sharper than a knife.

"That's not what I meant. He's gonna wake up, you know that, right?"

"And then what?"

"And then we'll see. This is- new. There's no way to tell."

"But you think it's permanent."

"We don't know that."

"But you think so."

"...Yeah. If the serum were still active in his system, it would have kicked in by now."

Silence. Then: "I hate seeing him like this. He'd hate being seen this way."

"He never struck me as the self-pitying type."

"That's exactly my point."

"Perhaps. He's free of it, either way. He could do anything."

"Anything but this, you mean."

"I didn't say that, either."

"But everyone's thinking it."

"You don't know that."

"I don't need to."

* * *

Steve remembers the briefing. _We need you on this one, Cap_.

Are you sure that's wise? I'm not trying to sell myself short, but I'm not sure I'll be much use-

_Normally, yes. But I've got a madman trying to rip a hole in the universe, and he's succeeding. Temporal inertia, Cap, that's what you've got. _

I don't understand.

_Every building within a mile of that thing built after 1985 is ending up – merged. Or unmade. I can't get anyone near the damn thing without their brains trying to leak out of their ears. _

_Whatever he's trying to do,_ Stark interrupts, _it's centered on something recent. And anyone or anything that has experienced much change, that hasn't remained static over the past thirty or so years is vulnerable to the instabilities induced by someone screwing with quantum decoherence- which shouldn't even be possible, by the way, let alone with some oversized backyard science project- _

Can I get that in English?

_It shouldn't be a problem for you, _Fury translates. _Or Thor. The thing is-_

_It's not that complicated, _says Stark, interrupting again. _You were an ice cube for the last three quarters of a century, and Thor wasn't even on this planet. Temporal inertia. There aren't that many points of difference for you over the last several decades. You should be okay, Cap._

Fury raises an eyebrow, and Stark shrugs, then gestures for Fury to continue. Fury gives him an ironic look. _That's why we're sending you out, _he says. _You should be able to get close. Find a way to stop it. Stop him. _He slides a file across the table. Steve flips it open. A smiling man looks out at him from a faculty portrait. There's a name at the top: Doctor Peter Vale.

Okay. When are we leaving?

Fury smiles. There's no humor in it. _Right now. _


	4. Awakening

Waking is...problematic.

For one thing, it hurts. Steve blinks, and the light seems to bore directly into his brain. The brightness of the room is disorienting. His limbs feel leaden. His throat burns. It's hard to breathe and there are tubes and wires and the steady beep of a heart monitor. But that's not all he hears. Far enough off to be muted, near enough to rattle the walls, something booms.

Explosives. There's the sharp rattle of gunfire. Screams.

It's the last more than anything that pulls him to full alertness. He tries to sit up, and immediately regrets doing so. Even  
breathing hurts. He knows enough field medicine to recognize broken ribs if he hadn't had plenty of personal experience with them before. But the sound of gunfire is getting louder and the acrid stench of burning plastic has begun to make itself known. Steve leans back into the pillows for a moment, then reaches up with one arm and pulls the off the heart monitor leads. Next goes the IV in his arm and the oxygen tube resting in his nostrils. He grabs hold of the bed-rail and then pulls himself up before he can think twice about it. He has several unpleasant seconds after that, one trembling arm braced against the rail as he takes shallow, shallow breaths. He swings his legs down off the bed and manages to get to his feet. His balance is unsteady, but not as bad as he first feared. He stumbles to the door. The uniform is hanging on a hook. He grabs it, eager to have something more substantive to wear than the thin hospital gown. Pulling it down reveals his own reflection. There's a mirror on the door. He ignores it, but even a moment's glance was enough. Pale. Gaunt. He's lost the definition in his arms, and inches in his neck. He looks about as good as he feels, and for a second, he's struck with the sudden dread that he's lost more years, that he's walking into a new world again. He shakes it off. Whatever happened, whatever new changes there may be...it could wait. Another boom rattles the room and causes the lights to flicker. Steve dresses as quickly as he is able. The fabric's a lot looser than it was before, but he pushes the thought away.

He pushes the door open and takes another careful, painful step into a brightly lit corridor. The smoke is thicker out here, more biting. He holds his ribs and fights the urge to cough as he steps out of the doorway. He keeps one arm against the wall for support as he makes his way down the hallway. He feels like he's gone ten rounds with Thor in a heavy weight championship, but the pain is now settling into the old grooves carved out by war and just being up and moving has worked some bare minimum of strength back into his limbs. He's far from fighting fit, but he's moving and that counts for something. His head is clearing, too, as the urgency of the situation brushes away the cobwebs of dream and memory.

He rounds a corner just in time for another explosion to rock the building. The lights go out this time, and it's a few seconds before the back up generators kick on. At the end of the hallway, there are several SHIELD agents trying to conduct an evacuation from the looks of it, but as Steve watches, several soldiers come running in from the opposite hallways, shouting orders to get a move on before turning back and laying down fire. Steve increases his pace when another explosion knocks out the lights again. Steve stumbles in the dark, but manages to catch himself, barely avoiding the debris from the partial collapse of one wall. When the lights flicker back on, two of the evacuation personnel have been added to the ranks of the injured they've been trying to move out of the ward.

"Get these people out of here, NOW!" yells one of the soldiers, and some part of Steve is relieved to realize he recognizes the man as one of Fury's pet special forces sergeants. Steve hurries closer, and grabs one of the SHIELD agents hurrying to clear the debris. "What's your status, agent?" Steve asks, feeling out of breath, but pushing on regardless.

The agent has a moment of startled recognition when she sees Steve, but he says, "Sir! It's HYDRA. They've launched a strike against the hospital. We're evacuating ahead of them, but..." she trails off as a couple of other agents carry a young woman with a lot of bandages around her midsection out of a room and onto a gurney, and Steve gets her meaning. It's a medical ward. Move too quickly, and you might lose the patients anyway. "Where are we on reinforcements?"

"About four minutes. But HYDRA knows it, sir. They've been pressing hard, trying to get in and out before we can regroup."

"What are they after?"

The agent gives him a level look. " _You_, sir."

A wave of dizziness washes through Steve. He steadies himself against it, and pinches the bridge of his nose. "Okay," he says. "I want your team moving people out and down to the next hallway as quickly as you can. Don't worry about the debris- carry people if you have to. Do you have any medical personnel on your team?" The agent nods. "Good. Check with them as to how to proceed, but there's a lot of medical equipment and empty rooms down the hallway behind me. Evacuate anyone who can walk or can be easily moved. Anyone more critical than that, have your medical person see if they can be set up in one of the other rooms. Move equipment if you have to. If there's time- if it's possible- prep them for moving out of the hospital. Set up a barricade right here- and another one just before the corner."

The agent looks ready to protest. "Is there a problem, agent?" Steve says, letting an edge creep into his voice.

"No, sir," the agent says, "But-"

Steve crosses his arms. It's less intimidating than it used to be, but it is still apparently effective.

"Our orders are to get you clear," the agent says, almost apologetically.

"The situation has clearly changed, agent," Steve says. "You've got two men down and I'm obviously one of the least-injured here."

"But-"

Steve pushes past the nausea and stands up straight. "I gave you an order, agent," Steve says in a tone that brooked no argument."Oh," he adds. "And I'm going to need a gun." After a slightly startled pause, the agent nods sharply and starts barking orders to her team.

Steve takes the gun and spare clips offered by one of the injured agents and makes his way down towards the soldiers, who are hunkered down behind an overturned desk and several gurneys. The sergeant looks up and grins when he sees him.

"Glad you could make it, Cap," he says.

Somewhere outside, thunder booms. Steve gets into position, ignoring the protests of his ribs and the weakness in his  
chest. "Wouldn't miss it for the world, Sergeant."


	5. Epilogue

"So." Fury taps the file in his hand against the desk before laying it down and flicking through the pages.

Steve leans back in his chair and tries to find a comfortable position. All he manages to do is aggravate his ribs. He stifles a wince and schools his face into something attentive and neutral. "So."

Fury glares across the table. The glare is not, for the most part, aimed at Steve himself, but he feels a measure of sympathy for the woman bearing the brunt of it. Fury waits until the silence has been drawn out to an uncomfortable degree before speaking. "Anyone want to explain how an evacuation ends up getting run by its prime evacuee- a man, who I might add, spent the twenty-four hours prior to the attack unconscious in a hospital bed?"

"Sir- if I may," starts the evacuation team leader.

"It was a rhetorical question, Agent," Fury drawls. His tone is even, almost pleasant. This does not seem to bring any comfort to the woman it is directed at. "You had orders," he continues, "You failed to follow them. And as a result one clusterfuck turned into two which turned into one hell of a mess I'm left at a loss to explain."

"Director Fury," Steve interjects, "With all due respect, the situation on the ground-"

"Does not negate the mission objective," Fury says, momentarily turning to face Steve. "I'm a reasonable man. I understand the need for flexible battlefield strategy. But I get less _reasonable_ when it comes to completely subverting the mission objective," he finishes, his gaze once again centered on the evacuation team leader.

"Sir," says the agent. Her words are firm but her demeanor is resigned. "I take full responsibility. I disobeyed orders and failed to complete our primary mission."

"Yeah, I thought you might." Fury turn one baleful eye on Steve, then glances back at the team leader. "Agent Glick, consider this your warning. And next time I tell you not to let a valuable asset get kidnapped by the enemy, don't let the asset talk you into a situation that allows for just that."

"Yessir."

"Dismissed," Fury says, and the agent quickly gets up and leaves the room. Once she's gone, he sighs and leans back in his chair. For a long moment, he says nothing.

"No reprimand for me?" Steve asks at last, his tone light. "It was my call that lead to the failure of the mission." Fury gives him a look that'd peel paint.

"Don't push it, Captain. It's already been a couple of long-ass days."

"I can't say it's been a picnic for me either, Director Fury."

Fury's hard stare doesn't fade, but his tone softens. "No, I guess not. Have the doctors talked to you?"

Steve shrugs. "Yeah. It was...pretty familiar, actually."

"Really."

Steve looks away, towards the window, but he's not really seeing it. "Weak lungs, bad heart... The doctors talked a lot about options, treatment. Quality of life." He shakes his head ruefully. "That was different, at least. If we'd had half of what they do today-" He shrugs. "Water under the bridge now."

"Yes," Fury says, and there's regret in his voice. He slides the file he'd been holding across the table. "I've been asked to give this to you."

Steve takes the file and opens it. He glances down at the contents, then just as quickly back up at Fury, his gaze questioning.

"You've more than earned it, Captain." Fury says, his tone neutral. "Take a couple of days. You're still recovering. There's time enough later to discuss the future."

Steve stands, wincing a little as his ribs protest. He carefully sets the file, with its generous terms and its honorable discharge back down on the table. "In that case, sir," he says, laying one hand flat against the paper, "I think this can wait a few days, too."

Fury shrugs. "It's your life, Captain."

Steve nods, non-committal. "If that's all, Director Fury...?"

Fury ignores the hint, but he does turn away as if to stare out one of the windows on the side of the conference room. "While you're thinking over your options, you might want to swing by Stark Tower. I know Stark is up to some damn thing, you might want to check in on it."

Steve frowns, unsure what game Fury is playing now. "Okay. Anything else?"

Fury gestures dismissively. "I'm sure you'll figure it out soon enough, Captain. But it occurs to me..."

"...yes?"

"Did Stark ever tell you how he got into this whole gig of his to become the giant pain in my ass he is today?"

Steve frown grows deeper, still not sure where Fury is going with this. Steve's curiosity is definitely piqued, but there's obviously something he doesn't know, or is missing, but Fury's been in the spy business far too long for Steve to expect anything like a straight answer from the man. "Uh- I don't know much more than what I read in the briefing. Something about an attack in Afghanistan, taken prisoner by some hostiles with Stark's own weapons?"

"That's part of it. Go see Stark, Captain. While you're taking these few days and thinking over your _options_, go ask him how he got in the game in the first place. I think you'll find it...enlightening."

Steve's puzzlement must show on his face, because Fury taps a finger on his chest. "Man's got some experience with...heart trouble. You might find that presents interesting possibilities, Captain."

"I'll be sure to ask him," Steve says.

"You do that, Captain," Fury replies, his focus turning back to the paperwork in front of him. Steve can recognize a dismissal when he sees one, so he nods respectfully, and makes good his escape. A cheerful woman with a riot of curly brown hair pulled back into a ponytail greets him as he goes through the door., then falls in step with him as he walks down the corridor. "I see you made it out in one piece, Captain Rogers," she says. "I was beginning to wonder-"

"If Fury was going to finish what HYDRA started?" Steve keeps his tone dry, but gives the SHIELD agent standing next to him a knowing look. She's been his faithful shadow for the last several days, head of the protection detail he'd been placed under the minute he'd walked out of HYDRA's outpost. She was good at her job, he had to admit. But she covered the hard-edged particulars with an endless stream of light-hearted chit-chat and friendly asides. He was sure more than a few people had underestimated her because of it, but he was sure they came to regret it. And if nothing else, it made her constant presence more than tolerable, though being the guarded rather than the guard was never going to be something he was entirely comfortable with.

She shrugs. "Hey, you said it, not me. Personally, I'd rather face AIM or HYDRA or any of those losers. They can only kill you, right?"

"They can be pretty inventive, Agent Robinson." Steve says.

She looks at him askance. "So can he."

"Is that how you ended up on babysitting duty?"

She makes a dismissive gesture. "Please, I actively avoid getting on the shit list. Maybe that'd be the case if it were any security detail other than yours, Cap. Walk in the park. Plus, it gives me a chance to catch up on my reading."

Steve grins at that and shakes his head.

She quirks her lips up in a smile, then turns back to business. "So where are we going?"

"Stark Tower."

She considers this. "Nice. I could use a day in the city."

"I don't suppose there's any point in trying to convince you that I'm more than capable of making it there on my own."

"Of course not. This? This is practically a vacation for me."

Steve shakes his head. "In that case, I won't rob you of your down-time, Agent Robinson."

Her lips twitch. "Glad to hear it."

* * *

****Stark's skyscraper jutted out from the ruins like a storybook tower. The clean up and reconstruction efforts had been well underway, but it'd still be sometime before the city looked anything like it had before the attacks, and so the image persisted. Steve guessed it was appropriate; Stark definitely fit the role of mad wizard in his tower...and if Stark were the man behind the curtain, Steve guesses that makes him the Tin Woodman. (He knows better than to ask for a way home.) Steve walks through the big showy doors with Agent Robinson, who keeps up a friendly patter as she openly gawks at the lobby inside- and cannily cases the room for threats. A light like a camera flash goes off right as they pass through the second set of doors, but it's over before Steve can find its source. He's greeted at the front desk by a receptionist who sunnily informs him as he signs in that his visit has been expected. A man soon appears at her elbow. He's wearing a suit, but he has the hard, muscular build of a soldier, even if he's dressed like a pencil-pusher. When he leans over the desk to check the log, Steve catches a glimpse of a gun in a holster.

"If I could just see your IDs," he says, and while Steve fumbles with his wallet, Agent Robinson smoothly pulls a badge from the inside pocket of her coat. The man takes it, and says, "Oh, no need for that, Captain. You've already been cleared." It's on Steve's lips to ask by whom or what, since he just walked through the door two seconds ago, but he decides it's not worth the hassle of asking. The man looks over Agent Robinson's badge, and then runs it through a machine, which beeps. He hands it back to her, and she nods appreciatively and tucks it away.

"Right this way, Sir, Ma'am," the man says, leading them around a corner, away from the main elevator, to a small nook off the side entrance. He taps a clear glass panel in the wall, which lights up into a keypad. He enters a code, and then presses his palm to the glass, which beeps.

And then the wall cracks, and Steve realize it's not a wall at all, but a discreet private elevator. The man ushers them inside, and then the doors close and they elevator is swiftly ascending, gliding more smoothly and more quickly than any elevator Steve has ever been on. It's not helping with the idea of this place as Oz, especially with the slightly green light of the front panel (more glass, Steve notes) reflecting against the mirror-polished steel and lending the elevator interior a distinctive green cast. After a few long moments, the elevator glides to a stop and the doors open on a room that looks more like a mechanic shop than a scientist's lab. The walls and floor are bare concrete, and there are long rows of work benches covered in tools - some neatly displayed, others scattered haphazardly. The robots, strangely, don't really ruin the image as much as add to it, but that's probably has more to do with Stark than the robots themselves. He has his back mostly to them, but even from this angle, Steve can see what is clearly a welder's helmet and apron, but the flying sparks are probably the bigger clue.

Defeaningly loud music pours from hidden speakers, but it cuts off suddenly as soon as Steve steps out of the elevator. Agent Robinson follows, and the doors slide shut behind them, carrying away the security man. Stark sets the welding torch down, turns, and pushes the helmet up.

"Hey- uh." Stark says. "Fury give you my message?" He looks less manic than he did when Steve first saw him in the hospital, but no less tired.

"Not exactly," Steve says. "He just suggested a visit wouldn't be wasted."

"Of course he did," Stark mutters, turning to fiddle with something on the table next to him. It flashes to life and some sort of display pops up above it. Stark waves his fingers at it, once again putting Steve in mind of a magician.

"Well, you've got good timing anyway," he says. "I've got something I want to show you, been working on it the past couple of days. Just a couple of ideas I was throwing around. Some options, you know."

"Lay them on me," Steve says, thinking of Oz and his bag of tricks.

Stark flashes him a haggard but incandescent grin. "Prepare to be amazed, Captain."

"You don't have a heart in there for me somewhere, do you?" Steve says, only half joking.

"Oh no," Stark says, serious as Steve's ever seen him. "Something much, much better."

* * *

****Fury had been right: It definitely turned into a visit full of possibility. Steve asked Agent Robinson to convey as much on her way back to the base. He figured that was all the anwer Fury needed.

**The end.**


End file.
